DISTRIBUTION OF THE FACJS'AS. 377 



faunas do ; and, like them also, may be distinguished into 

 two provinces, the colder of which embraces Patagonia. But, 

 besides differing from the tropical faunas, they are also quite 

 unlike each other on the different continents. Instead of 

 that general resemblance, that family likeness, which we 

 have noticed between all the faunas of the temperate zone of 

 'the northern hemisphere, we find here the most complete con- 

 trasts. Each of the three continental peninsulas jutting 

 out southerly into the ocean represents, in some sense, a 

 separate world. The animals of South America, beyond the 

 tropic of Capricorn, are, in all respects, different from those 

 at the southern extremity of Africa. The hyenas, wild boars, 

 and rhinoceroses of the Cape of Good Hope have no analogues 

 on the American continent ; and the difference is equally great 

 between the birds, reptiles, fishes, insects and mollusks. 

 Among the most characteristic animals of the southern ex- 

 tremity of America are peculiar species of seals, and especially 

 among aquatic birds, the penguins. 



615. New Holland, with its marsupial mammals, with 

 which are associated insects and mollusks no less singular, 

 furnishes a fauna still more peculiar, and which has no simi- 

 larity to those of any of the adjacent countries. In the seas of 

 that continent, where every thing is so strange, we find the 

 curious shark, with paved teeth and spines on the back 

 (Cestracion Philippii), the only living representative of a 

 family so numerous in former zoological ages. But a most 

 remarkable feature of this fauna is, that the same types pre- 

 vail over the whole continent, in its temperate as well as its 

 tropical portions, the species only being different in different 

 localities. 



616. TROPICAL FAUNAS. The tropical faunas are dis- 

 tinguished, on all the continents, by the immense variety of 

 animals which they comprise, not less than by the brilliancy 

 of their dress. All the principal types of animals are 

 represented, and all contain numerous genera and species. 

 We need only refer to the tribe of humming-birds, which 

 numbers not less than three hundred species. It is very im- 

 portant to notice, that here are concentrated the most per- 

 fect, as well as the most singular types of all the classes of the 

 animal kingdom. The tropical region is the only one occu- 

 pied by the quadrumana, the herbivorous bats, the great 



